Tedim language
The Tedim language is a Tibeto-Burman language spoken mostly in the southern Indo-Burmese border. It is the native language of the Tedim tribe of the Zomi people, and a form of standardized dialect merging from the Sukte and Kamhau dialects. It is a subject-object verb language, and negation follows the verb. It is mutually intelligible with the Paite language.
History
Zomi was the primary language spoken by Pau Cin Hau, a religious leader who lived from 1859 to 1948. He also devised a logographic and later simplified alphabetic script for writing materials in Zomi.Phonology
The phonology of Zomi can be described as VT order, where C represents a consonant, V represents a vowel, T represents a tone, and parentheses enclose optional constituents of a syllable.Consonants
- Approximants can be heard as allophones of vowels /i̯, u̯/ within diphthongs.
- /x/ can also be heard as an aspirated velar stop in free variation.
Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
| Close | iu̯ i̯a | ui̯ uːi̯ u̯a | |
| Mid | ei̯ ɛːi̯ eu̯ ɛːu̯ | ou̯ oi̯ ɔːi̯ | |
| Open | ai̯ aːi̯ au̯ aːu̯ |
- Sounds /ɛ, ɔ/ may have short allophones of more close .
Tone